Over the years, there have been minimal improvements made to hammers and various impact hand tools. For example, manufacturers have modified the hammer head in various ways to improve the ability to perform certain functions, like driving nails, or making demolition more efficient. Various claw designs have also been developed for specific tasks. Almost universally, however, the head portion of hammer is attached way to a perpendicular handle portion. While the handle is a highly useful appendage for the hammer in most cases, there are situations where the handle portion of a hammer becomes a drawback. For example, there are situations in demolition or steel girder assembly in commercial building construction where confined work spaces or space limitations prevent typical swings of a sledge hammer with its long perpendicular handle. Simply removing or shortening the handle is not a satisfactory solution. Such techniques make the head portion impractical to handle and/or significantly reduce the impact force the craftsman desires to deliver to the target. It would be highly desirable to be able to deliver significant hammer impact force to a target in a confined range. The present invention addresses this need.